(Henry James (1843-1916), U.S. author. Preface repr. In The Art of the Novel, ed. R.P. Blackmur (1934). The Altar of the Dead, preface, Preface first published in The Novels and Tales of Henry James, vol. 17, New York ed. (1909).
The Altar of the Dead was originally published in 1895.)

Where beauty is worshipped for beauty's sake as a goddess, independent of and superior to morality and philosophy, the most horrible putrefaction is apt to set in. The lives of the aesthetes are the far from edifying commentary on the religion of beauty.

Since art is the expression of beauty and beauty can be understood only in the form of the material elements of the true idea it contains, art has become almost uniquely feminine. Beauty is woman, and also art is woman.